Yes He did!
The Law was given to only one group of people, that is Israel, and given only as a temporary foreshadowing during the old covenant time.
Hebrews 8:13 “When He said, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear.”
This brings us to an important question; “Why do people today, like the Jewish Christians of old still believe in and follow religious procedures?” Religious Judaism, (which is similar to any religious system of our day) was falsely depending on what they could do rather than discovering what God had already done. Religion like the old covenant was dying of old age. That is why Paul says the law was “growing old (and) is ready to disappear.”
God speaks of a new (covenant), and by so doing made the first (covenant) obsolete. God declares the old covenant, the Mosaic covenant of Law, displaced and replaced by the inauguration of the New Covenant. The New Covenant supersedes the old preliminary agreement of the old covenant.
God, through Paul, was counseling the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem that the old covenant was a thing of the past, out-of-date and obsolete! There is no reason for Christians to seek to follow the old covenant laws which have been cancelled by the finished work of Jesus Christ at the cross. The laws of Moses have been done away with!
Colossians 2:14 “...having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.”
The point of reference of the New Covenant is Jesus Christ, not religious performance. The New Covenant has been determined by God and, yet is relational. The New Covenant takes the focus off of physical observes of man and such as the Jewish priests in the temple and focuses on Christ in you a “tabernacle, not made with hands” (9:11).
The priestly ministry of Jesus in us allows the Christian to function as God intended. We participate and become the expressers of His glorious character and this becomes apparent as Christ is living out His life in us. We experience, as we choose to obey, the “out lived life!” In the new covenant the concept of “law” has been radically changed. The law is no longer an outward set of regulations to be kept or performed. When the New Covenant in Christ came "in the fullness of time" (Gal.4:4), the law was written on our hearts.
“FOR THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE...I WILL PUT MY LAWS INTO THEIR MINDS, AND I WILL WRITE THEM ON THEIR HEARTS” (Heb. 8:10).
The concept of “law” and “covenant” are opposed to one another. Under law there is conditional blessing; “if” you do this you will be blessed.
Exodus 15: 26 “And He said, “If you will give earnest heed to the voice of the LORD your God, and do what is right in His sight, and give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have put on the Egyptians; for I, the LORD, am your healer.”
This kind of arrangement often leads to misunderstanding on our part and provides the basis for “legalism.” Under a law system, commands are dependent on performance and obedience. Legalism is based on keeping the rules, the principles or the precepts of Law for acceptance.
The New Covenant is based on grace not performance. Grace is God’s activity or action, what He is doing. New Covenant grace is relational. This relationship has been initiated in the heart of the Trinity. The New Covenant was birthed out of God’s presence and is experienced by His presence, while still allowing for us to choose to be responsible to God’s activity. A faith response to grace is what responsibility “is made. “Response-ability” is the basis of intimacy with God which is dependent and derived from the very heart of God.
In the New Covenant the conditional “if” is replaced by the magnificent “I AM.” I AM who I AM and I do what I do because I AM who I AM. The mystery of the New Covenant is that, although it began in the heart of God it allows for man to be receptive in his “heart/spirit” toward God. This is possible because God has designed us as choosing “faith creatures.” Faith is “our part,” whereby we believe and receive what God is doing in us. As we believe, we experience the relational oneness of the New Covenant and the Triune activity of God.
The intent of the Law was to reveal the character of God and has now been revealed in the New Covenant in the Son, Jesus Christ.
“And He (Jesus) is the radiance of His (Father’s) glory and the exact representation of His (Father) nature...” Hebrews 1:3.
Because God’s activity is grace and His activity is always consistent with His character, God can and does, do whatever He wants. Because of Pentecost, every believer is indwelt by the Holy Spirit. The outcome is, God can and does initiate His commands in us and He is the means of man carrying out His activity.
He is the source of His own doing.
2 Corinthians 12:9 “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.”
His grace is our ability! New Covenant obedience is our willingness to “listen under” His directives. Obedience is no longer performance oriented but the
“obedience of faith” (Rom. 1:5).
We are free to admit and declare, “I can’t do it but God can.”
“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13).
The need of our day, as in the day of the early church, is for believers to discover the dynamic life Jesus Christ, as our life. Christ “in you” (your human spirit), “as you” (as you choose in your soul), and Christ “through you” (His activity expressed through your body).
God did away with the Laws of Moses! Christians have had a wrong “point of reference” for far too long. God gave Jesus who is the personification of the New Covenant.
The Message bible states in John 3:16-18
“This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn't go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person's failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.”
The gospel is God’s gift to man, not man trying to obey the rules or keep commandments.
Col. 3:1-4 “Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.”
That is why I have been telling people to stop trying to live the Christian life! You can't! Only Jesus Christ can live His life! He is the Life! The good news of the gospel is to receive the indwelling presence of the son of God, Jesus Christ as our very Life!
Gal. 2:20-21 “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly.”
News flash! Did you read that? “...if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly.”
